The administration has taken serious steps to rein in Russia, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told lawmakers Wednesday, pushing back against a Congress increasingly convinced President Trump has emboldening enemies and poisoned foreign relations with America’s allies.
Mr. Pompeo said “based on the many hours I have spent briefing President Trump,” the president does, in fact, accept the intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia meddled in the 2016 election.
And Mr. Pompeo specifically said the administration does not recognize Russia’s annexation of Crimea during the Obama administration, and vowed to keep U.S. sanctions in place until the peninsula is returned to the control of Ukraine.
Those declarations came at the top of a high-stakes hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the first in a series of hearings the panel will hold to highlight what lawmakers see as a foreign policy adrift.
“From where we sit, it appears that in a ready fire aim fashion the White House is waking up every morning and making it up as they go,” said Chairman Bob Corker, Tennessee Republican.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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